At the Hour of Our Death
by coteriedufromage
Summary: Near felt like an intruder here. One shot, spoilers, not shippy in the least bit.


**Note:** This is Athens' first fanfic~. So yeah.  
**Disclaimer:** None of the characters or situations of Death Note are mine.

The scent of worn leather and stale smoke pervaded the room, almost seeming to condense into a dark haze above broken bottles and cigarettes butts scattered across the dingy stained carpet. He picked his way around piles of unwashed clothes and empty Chinese food cartons, vaguely hoping that roaches wouldn't scurry out of the dwelling's many hidden corners. Weak late-afternoon sunlight filtered into the room between the spaces in the blinds of the single narrow window, the sun's rays illuminating floating specks of dust which seemed to make up the air itself. Under the window was a bed, still unmade as though its occupant had just woken up to use the toilet and start the morning routine. Situated on the right was a small kitchen area, consisting of a refrigerator, a round table big enough to seat four, a burnt out stove and the open cupboards above them revealing empty shelves. Next to the door stood an aged beige leather couch facing an equally antiquated TV, probably salvaged from a dumpster, resting on a wobbly coffee table. The stereo system next to it, however, looked brand new, which probably meant stolen. A video console he didn't and wouldn't know the name of occupied the carpet space between the television and the couch. It was the single most cared for possession in the only room, the only thing not covered by a thin film of dust and crumbs. Another, just as old TV stood against the far wall, in view of the bed. Up toward the left of the tan-colored wall above the second TV was a circle of exposed wood where something had knocked out several layers of paint and plaster. Cracks in the paint radiated from the site of impact, and next to it, in scrunched capital letters was the word "HA!" written in black permanent marker. The whole place seemed to give an impression that whatever young and invincible delinquent lived here would return, bottle of whisky in hand and pretty girl in arm, stumbling in at 3 a.m. while other tenants slept.

In short, from what he could see, it was the average messy apartment of a pair of young bachelors, and definitely somewhere Near was not supposed to be.

He was moderately thankful that he had worn shoes today, not wanting to bruise his feet on the broken concrete outside. It had been 20 minutes since Gevanni had been ordered to open the lock and leave, and 10 minutes since Near had gotten the courage to walk through the door. It wasn't as if he were trespassing – the apartment's inhabitants were gone and would never come back – but it still felt criminal. Not to say that the young detective had never done anything criminal, but he felt uncomfortable here, where his two dead contemporaries had drank, slept, plotted against Kira. Everything screamed that this wasn't Near's territory, that he wasn't welcome here, but Near didn't put stock in holiness or any other ideas like that, so he went in anyway.

As for now his head was swimming with all the scents of the room, his eyes straining to see in the dim natural lighting. He had no idea what to do, now that he was here. There were no grieving families to offer mementos of the dead, nor were friends important enough to be contacted. Matt's body had been confiscated by the Japanese police force and buried in Japan; there was nothing even left of Mello to bury, even if they had a place to do it. A waste of time was what this was, Near had to admit. The thought disturbed him, however, so when the team had asked why he would take time off from the investigation to inspect Mello's apartment, he told them that there should be no loose ends. If there was even a shred of evidence against Kira, it was up to them to find and use it. Lester had looked concerned, but Linder had merely nodded and Gevanni remained silent, and that ended the conversation. It was almost an insult, in a way, to lie so blatantly to his team. But Near didn't have a solid reason, and being the rational person he was, that was simply not allowed.

Finding this place had been no problem, thanks to Linder. Near wondered how many times she had come through this door, sat on this couch or on that bed, or perhaps started her daily cycle in that bathroom. But it wasn't the most pleasant thing to think about, Near found, so he went into the kitchen to start his search. There were some papers, mostly over-due bills and one sheet of ripped looseleaf paper with a few phone numbers and initials on it. He folded this and tucked it into his side pants pocket. Not coming across anything else of interest, the white-haired boy wandered back into the main room. He still couldn't breathe properly, so he went to the bed under the window. Kneeling on the soft mattress, he forced the panel up with his delicate hands, ignoring the pinch of the sharp edges. The light breeze felt soothing against his pale skin as he watched the sky slowly fade from blue to yellow and pink with a faint brush of purple. After a few moments there, he figured that he should make use of the time before Gevanni returned to bring him back to his isolated sanctuary.

Coming off the bed, he made sure not to disturb the piles of clothes (they looked like Matt's) as he navigated to the hallway. The bedroom door was shut directly in front of him, an abrupt and heavy dead end. The golden knob looked fairly new, which led Near to speculate on what one of them had done to need a replacement door handle. Maybe time hadn't softened Mello's temper after all. Still feeling like a trespasser somehow, Near entered the room.

There was nothing surprising about the room – it was every bit as disheveled as the rest of the apartment. "Well," he breathed out loud. It was anti-climactic in a way that Mello, who had always aimed to shock, was boring Near with his very living space. The detective scanned the room for anything noticeable. After finding no notebooks or other paper to record anything on, Near began to rummage through the small closet space opposite the window, allocated for Mello's numerous leather and black ensembles. The startlingly familiar smell of leather stung his eyes, causing him to tear up. Wiping his eyes, he slid the door shut and turned toward the unmade double bed that took up most of the cramped space. Unearthing nothing from beneath the bed, Near systematically checked every aspect of the room before coming upon the bedside nightstand. Like everything else, it was unexceptional. It was as wide as his body and came up to about his waist, colored in typical dull browns and tans. Near rapped on the surface; it sounded like oak.

Opening the drawer proved to be a struggle. When Near finally wrenched it out, he saw that it was full of blurred Polaroid photographs, expired medication, a roll of gauze, and around twenty small notepads. Near pulled them out, separating them into orderly piles on the top of the nightstand. As he got deeper, he found more items buried under the disorder: a small digital camera that should have been crushed, a bloodied striped sleeve he barely dared to touch, a few assorted Lego pieces.

Near stopped digging, staring at the colorful blocks in his palm. He couldn't even begin to wonder what Mello would need these for. Mello had always taken a special perverse glee in teasing Near about his toy obsession. Though this merely bounced off the cold younger child, like all the other shallow insults, it seemed to be a mainstay of Mello's bullying.

He forced his attention off the tiny blocks (because Wammy's was a long time ago and it didn't matter anymore so he should stop getting distracted), and put them in his pocket alongside the paper. He attempted to resume his task with all the same efficiency as if this were a crime scene, extremely critical and demanding complete attention to task. But he noted with a certain nostalgia (though it was too faint to be accurately called a feeling) that all the photos were of places, not people. An unbidden ghost of a voice said, "At Wammy's you will only remember facts and nothing more." It had confused some of the incoming orphans, but it was perfectly clear to Near: their past lives, in real homes or foster homes or on the streets, it was all to be banished from memory. It wouldn't matter when they recreated themselves into the young geniuses that could either save the world or destroy it. And anyway, Near doubted that Mello knew anyone that important, and apparently no one in Mello's life since then had been worth recollecting. _Or too important to be prey for Kira_, he thought. He was reminded of how over the past few years, parents had stopped getting their children's pictures taking, fearing the result if their child grew up to be a killer or thief. Of course this did nothing to prevent criminals from dying, but it was the principle that made people feel safe. It was precisely the kind of silliness Near was trying to eliminate by catching Kira.

Nearing the bottom of the drawer, Near's slender fingers wrapped around a fistful of marbles strung together. He didn't recognize the rosary as he pulled it out, which was odd, since every time Near had ever seen Mello, he had had a similar chain around his neck, cross resting over his heart. But this wasn't the one that was fused with Near's memory of Mello: this was something he had never seen. The glass beads were a translucent white, the figure of Christ carved out of untarnished silver. It was much too delicate, Near thought, to belong to the one he knew as a fiery spirit, defying anyone who even dared to imply that he wasn't the smartest, the fastest, the best. Near couldn't tell how old the prayer beads were, but recalled watching little plastic spheres roll across the playroom floor when Mello and Matt argued before the former left for good, and wondered why this wasn't broken yet. _It must have been special._ Was that it? Near hadn't known that Mello was capable of such care, so why should have cared about these, which didn't really mean anything? After all, if God couldn't, or just didn't, save Mello, or the world, from Kira, what kind of god was He?

But then again, Near observed, the rosary was at the bottom of the drawer. A drawer of forgotten recollections, it seemed, as Near flipped through pages dated months and years ago. Most of it was gang-related, only intelligible to Near because he had investigated everything about his rival before being contacted through Halle. He already had most of this information; it would take too long to piece together everything else for it to be of use at the moment. Still, it was obvious that nothing was more than a month old. And if these were just keepsakes of sorts, that made this all less relevant. It depressed Near, who had been expecting something more interesting out of this trip. If anything, Mello should have at least made this place interesting.

Near's eyes flicked back to the rosary. Here was something interesting, but not entirely welcome. He couldn't say what about it made him feel so uneasy, but it did. This was Mello's beliefs, his hidden sentimentality. Mello wasn't supposed to be sentimental, he was supposed to fit the hard and unyielding image that pervaded his mind now every time he deliberated with his team on the Kira case, or when the fake L of the Japanese police force addressed him as L, or whenever he saw a gun in the hands of Kira's supporters. It was unpredictable, and unfair for Mello to do this to him. Near desperately wished for the feel of plastic and cheap metal in his hands, just so he could think properly for a minute.

Rosary still in hand, Near climbed onto the soft white sheets next to him. It was definitely Mello's idea to put the beds under the windows. The vision of his adversary watching the sunset on the roof while the other orphans looked up in awe at him unconsciously invaded the still-living boy's mind. Near had been one of those children, allowing himself a little admiration for Mello's feat, and keeping in mind to ask him about it later. Near remembered that when he did ask, Mello, to his surprise, had actually explained his it to him, in painstaking detail and eliciting sharp denial from Matt. Near remembered that it was a special moment in his stay at the orphanage, when he could have almost pretended that they were friends instead of competitors. And for the first time since Near could remember, with the smell of leather surrounding him and the darkening sky extinguishing the light of the sun, tears started to form behind his eyes, and stubbornly refused to stay there.

Gevanni knocked lightly on the door, hoping that no one would come out of a nearby apartment to ask what he was doing. When there was no answer, he tested the door and found it to be unlocked. Not pausing to reflect on the appearance of the room, he looked around for his boss. Not spitting him, the older detective went down the hallway and through the one open door. There he found the boy curled up on sheets the same color as his pajama-clothes, clutching a string of glass beads. Scooping him up, with delicacy as to not awaken him, Gevanni reflected that he would have smiled if he were sure Near wouldn't wake up. Even geniuses needed their pride, after all.


End file.
